U of M or MSU?

<p>“Standardized tests are IQ tests, period.”</p>

<p>Of course they are bluebound18. That is why they are so easily raised by students who can afford to take classes specifically to improve test scores. </p>

<p>“Standardized tests are IQ tests, period” bluebound has spoken – so be it</p>

<p>Bluebound, what is your objective in posting in these threads? The OPs are asking specific questions and you turn every question into an opportunity to denigrate school that you perceive to be as sub-standard, and, in some cases, entire classes of people. You use gross generalizations and stereotypes to support your arguments. If these posts are evidence of your reasoning ability, methinks you are going to have some real problems in college. Or maybe you are just a ■■■■■ and trying to create arguments to see what kind of reaction you can get. I think right now if I said the world was round, you would insist it was flat. “Period.” Those of us on here are posting to help other students. I can’t figure out what it is you are trying to do. I would think a high school student would have better sources of amusement. </p>

<p>

Wrong. There might be a good correlation, but this statement is still false.</p>

<p>Foreveralone, there might be a good correlation assuming you are comparing people with similar backgrounds, circumstances etc…For example, if you are comparing two Americans who come from the same socioeconomic background, had similar preparation for the test and took the test the same number of times, then I agree that there might be good correlation. </p>

<p>However, what if they come from different socioeconomic backgrounds (some from wealthy families who attend excellent high schools while others from poor families who attend mediocre high schools)? What if English is not their native language? What if some test takers get a lot of professional test prepping help while others do not? What if some are taking the test for the first time while others are taking it for the third time? What if one test taker is 18 and another is 15? Any of those factors could have a significant impact on the result and not be an indication of IQ. What if more than one of those factors is at play? </p>

<p>Kids from the French school in Dubai do poorly on the SAT/ACT. A 2000/30 would be as good as it gets. Yet those kids go to universities like Brown, Columbia, Cornell, Michigan, Northwestern etc…, and maintain 3.7+ GPAs in majors like Engineering, Mathematics, Physics etc…without breaking a sweat. Are those kids any less intelligent that Americans who score 2300 on the SAT? Obviously not. </p>

<p>Besides, in life, many believe that EQ (maturity, social etiquette, emotional stability etc…) is far more important than IQ. I tend to agree.</p>

<p>“Every intellect knows ACT, SAT, GMAT, etc. are a form of IQ test”</p>

<p>I will repeat what I said earlier.</p>

<p>The following link from the official ACT website states </p>

<p>“The ACT is not an aptitude or an IQ test”</p>

<p><a href=“http://www.actstudent.org/faq/why.html”>http://www.actstudent.org/faq/why.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>I think ACT, Inc. knows the ACT better than you do.</p>

<p>bluebound18: “”____ university isn’t nearly as easy to get into as it used to be" is said about EVERY commode. State is still a gutter. The top 10% or 25% might be okay, but the rep is created by the bottom 75%. That bottom 75% have sub-25 ACT scores = not sharp by any metric. It’s a school for Oakland County slackers, a small % of middle class gunners (who go to graduate schools to push MSU down their resume) and mostly unmotivated kids that should be at their regional college figuring life out."</p>

<p>As a UM graduate I’d have to say you sound like a nasty piece of work. Don’t attend Michigan, I don’t think you’ll find a fit there and I seriously any UM grad with any self-respect would want you to represent UM…anywhere…in any context.</p>

<p>bluebound18: “Every intellect knows ACT, SAT, GMAT, etc. are a form of IQ test.” </p>

<p><== this isn’t really an English sentence, but let me assure you that you don’t know what you are talking about: AT BEST, SAT/GMAT et.al. have something like a 48% r-measure, so the explanatory power, the square, is actually quite low…around 25%. And, by design, they are not “like” an IQ test. Finally, IQ tests are pretty well debunked as being predictive/useful in tracking life trajectory…some theories argue for 9 dimensions of intelligence which are not strictly tested by IQ tests or under tests of “g”.</p>

<p>“If this is surprising to you, it sounds like some of you supposed UMich students and graduates could use some more psych electives. Not only are standardized tests a form of IQ measurement, studies show your IQ is relatively stable over time.”</p>

<p><== Given that standardized tests are NOT a form of IQ measurement, the relation to the types of study which you mention are meaningless. Further, what does the stability of IQ have to do with anything? For one thing, IQ is NOT stable. For another thing, it is not stable between generations (c.f., Flynn (sp?) effect). For another, the stability of a quantity like IQ which is so poorly explained by standardized tests means that any putative causal link would be spurious. For another, for your comment to be useful, you’d also have to prove both that the standardized tests themselves are stable (which they are not, they are periodically re-normed) and that the relationship between the presumtively stable components of the analysis are also stable. That stability has never been demonstrated.</p>

<p>In sum, rather than insulting UM students and graduates, you should spend 5 minutes on this topic on Wikipedia in order to realize that your arguments/reasoning are junk. As I’ve stated in another comment, you don’t seem like UM material. Feel free to matriculate elsewhere…I don’t think UM needs you out in the world as a brand ambassador.</p>

<p>

</p>

<p>Eh, in this case he’s pretty much right. State isn’t a good school and a lot of the in-staters I know here have commented on how they couldn’t really tell how big the difference between UM and MSU is until they got to school here and saw what kind of people they were studying with vs. the friends they know who go to State. Very few OOS kids ever consider attending MSU, and especially not those from the coasts where UM draws huge numbers. The overall academic experience at UM is head and shoulders above MSU.</p>

<p>^^LOL I hope you are being facetious…I almost spit my coffee onto my keyboard this morning. If anything both of you have successfully supported the concept that some of the students in Ann Arbor have a touch of arrogance.</p>

<p>

</p>

<p>I’m going to have to disagree with you there. Yes, in many departments/aspects Michigan is superior in quality of academic offerings to State, but that doesn’t mean that MSU is not a good school. MSU does graduate a lot of successful and well-prepared students, and I don’t think it’s fair to disregard that. </p>

<p>Absolutely - face it there’s a slew of public schools that OSS kids that post right here apply to that are lower ranked than MSU - UDel, Colorado School of Mines, SUNY-Bing and Buffflo, UMass and I could on and on are lower ranked than MSU. And MSU is high ranked that many of the schools in the Big Ten if you are into grouping colleges by sports leagues. Finally both Michigan AND Michigan State are in the top 100 of International rankings of which there is only a handful of US universities even in the top 100… I’m not a huge advocate of USNWR or any ranking really but let’s face it.it is alittle tiring as an avowed UofM supporter to see the sheeer ignorance of some of the young people that post on this forum. </p>

<p>OP good luck with your decision…frankly you can’t go wrong either way to choose.</p>

<p>I must agree with Finnlet. Anybody who has the presence of mind of posting himself as Laurence Olivier’s Richard III should be heeded. MSU has many excellent qualities and is a good university in its own right. That being said, I would usually recommend Michigan over MSU unless there is a significant difference in CoA or a major issue with fit. From the initial post, it seems that the OP prefers MSU over Michigan, but not to the point where I would necessarily say he should pick MSU. At any rate the OP has never returned to this forum, so I suspect he already made up his mind. </p>